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[Gamer79]

Let's take Zelda Botw and Totk.

Despite the framerate of both games running at 30fps and even dipping into the 20's the game feels silly smooth. I never notice input lag or stuttering I never notice choppy movement or that sluggish feel, both games are smooth as silk.

Idk if there is any other developer capable of putting games at the scale of Botw and Totk on switch hardware. When every other developer makes games at 30fps it's easy to tell. Most experience the symptoms I listed above.

I don't mean to keep stroking Nintendo off but you have to give credit where it is due. What is the secret sauce?

 

[DAHGAMING]

They dont in my opinion, I havnt played TOTK so I cant speak for that but BOTW is the same as other 30fps slug fests.

 

[analog_future]

Plenty of Nintendo games feel choppy at times.

And they keep most of their games around 30 because most of their games look like uprezzed GameCube games.

 

[German Hops]

Monolith are programming gods.
They've been the best acquisition Nintendo has ever made.

 

[Fbh]

I was actually surprised by how little I was bothered by the 30fps in ToTK. It actually does look and feel pretty smooth.
I think at least part of it is that they don't bother with super detailed animations. Games from studios like Naughty Dog or Rockstar can often have very realistic and detailed animations but they also make the game feel less responsive, and when you pair that with 30fps it's even worse.

 

[ZoukGalaxy]

Once upon a time, devs used to optimize games and get the most of a fixed hardware.
Nowadays, devs just beg for better hardware to run their un-optimized code.

Nintendo somewhat still manage to perpetuate the tradition ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

[ssringo]

I certainly wouldn't call them "smooth" but they run ok.

Benefits of using the same framework and being able to take a lot of time working out kinks.

 

[cinnamonandgravy]

frametimes

 

[NiiloPielinen]

Once upon a time, devs used to optimize games and get the most of a fixed hardware.
Nowadays, devs just beg for better hardware to run their un-optimized code.

Nintendo somewhat still manage to perpetuate the tradition ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Once upon a time, gaming companies were run by people who were gamers. Now days games have 100+ million $ budgets and there are suits demanding that games are published as soon as possible. Optimizing for potatoes isn't cost-effective.

 

[struggler_guts]

By giving you rose tinted glasses?

Lol there's slowdown all over the place in zelda I don't know what you're talking about.

 

[L*][*N*K]

They dont in my opinion, I havnt played TOTK so I cant speak for that but BOTW is the same as other 30fps slug fests.

Your opinion is upside down

 

[AJUMP23]

Art style probably helps. I have had a couple of times in TOTK where I was transitioning from sky to depths where the game just stopped to load. And once on a boss fight I had that.

 

[GigaBowser]

Gonai technologies

Game dev blown away by Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom says it "shouldn't be possible on the Switch"

"Nintendo's out here making people look like fools on hardware that's literally tenfold what the Switch is"

www.gamesradar.com

 

[cireza]

the game feels silly smooth

Hum nope, they really don't.

Metroid Prime Remastered is smooth and looks really good on top of it. But this is an exception. Both Zelda games look pretty bad honestly. Doesn't mean you cannot enjoy the game, but let's not pretend they look awesome and have a great framerate.

 

[Low Moral Fibre]

I had to move my Switch from my OLED to my LCD as both games feel like a stuttery mess with near instant response times of an OLED. I'm sure it's fine on handheld but not on a huge TV screen.

It looks ok on a big LCD.

I'm willing to accept as it is one of the best games I've ever played but let's not kid ourselves that TOTK runs well or looks smooth.

 

[StueyDuck]

Imagine if all the biggest disappointments this year like redfall,jedi survivor (at launch) and so on got such leniency as well.

Framedrops below 30 shouldn't be acceptable

 

[Mephisto40]

I don't think creating a topic called "framefrate magic" and then writing in your post you are getting dips below 30fps is sensible tbh

 

[G-DannY]

What is the secret sauce?

fanboyism

 

[Wingnut]

Because the 30fps vs 60fps discussion is overblown and don’t matter that much if the game is good.

 

[LordOcidax]

Correct frame time/frame pacing and double buffer vsync. The only problem is when drop a single frame it goes direct to 20fps due the double buffer, but the control response time is excellent. And when it runs at 30 fps due the excellent frame pacing looks smoother than a 30 fps on PC.

 

[YeulEmeralda]

It's called the placebo effect. If you see Nintendo logo 30fps automatically feels good.

 

[WhiteWaterM00se]

Nintendo has plenty of issues. The reason they are so successful though, is whatever graphical/art style they choose, make sure It is not too taxing on the hardware. So the gameplay can be smooth as possible.


That said, Links awakening, BOTW, ToTK, Pokémon, Xenoblade, Mario Rabbids, Bayonetta 3, all say “hi”! These are the ones I can think of.

They don’t run the best.


I think They deserve credit for the adjustment to ARM processing. But they are not wizards better than everyone else. They are the same scale as Sony first party, MS first party, and Valve.

 

[Moses85]

???
TotK??

It runs ok, most of the Time, but smooth??

Only if I overclock the RAM of my Switch it runs smooth.

 

[FunkMiller]

Have to say, after 100 hours with the Switch docked on my LG CX 65inch, I'm very impressed with how smooth it is - most of the time. There are drops and lags here and there, of course there are, but it's seriously impressive that they managed to cram this much game into such an old technology, maintaining the performance it does.

Goes to show that if you only design a game for one platform, you can squeeze the most performance out of it, in a way you can't, when you have to develop for multiple platforms (either at release or a few months or years down the line).

The video games industry stopped being cutting edge, the day it decided games had to run on more than one platform.

 

[Thaedolus]

I’m pretty sure it’s the use of a double buffer rather than a triple buffer, as DF pointed out. There’s less input latency with this, however when the system can’t hold 30FPS, then it totally tanks

 

[Shut0wen]

Talented developers and longer development on a single console leads to great things, pretty much the reason why some developers like naughty dog thrive from it being exclusive to sony consoles

 

[Esppiral]

Check your eyesight

 

[SlimySnake]

I was actually surprised by how little I was bothered by the 30fps in ToTK. It actually does look and feel pretty smooth.
I think at least part of it is that they don't bother with super detailed animations. Games from studios like Naughty Dog or Rockstar can often have very realistic and detailed animations but they also make the game feel less responsive, and when you pair that with 30fps it's even worse.

Uncharted 4 had an input lag of over 150 ms. KZ2, the poster child for awful input lag was 180 ms 'fixed' to 150 ms after patches. Its definitely the animations and whatever post processing these AAA games have going on because even with the 60 fps and 120 fps patches for Uncharted 4 on PS5, the input lag was still very high at 120 ms and 96 ms respectively.

in comparison, cod is under 40 ms in its 60 fps mode.

 

[kvltus lvlzvs]

By dmcaing emulation channels

 

[JimboJones]

It runs as well as it could at 30fps with the double buffered vsync and I've been surprised at how little it does drop compared to the early preview comments, it's certainly playable, buuuuuut the drops when they do happen are kind of brutal.

I wouldn't go as far as calling it "magic" but it's definitely a best case scenario for the hardware as this point and I'm sure they worked hard to get it running like that.

Still makes me want a "Switch 2"

 

[mykedo0909]

I did run cp2077 on the series x in 30fps mode, and played on the same monitor botw 30fps..the difference was night and day. It has maybe sth to do with frame pacing instead of fps?

 

[Wildebeest]

Too many graphics engines are too invested in effects technology that makes everything look blurry, weirdly distorted or like a film from the 1970s to care about latency and responsiveness.

 

[YeulEmeralda]

Check your eyesight

In fairness is someone is used to it they might not see it.

I can't go back to 60 hertz phone screen for instance but I'm told by people that they don't notice lag.

 

[Polygonal_Sprite]

Simple geometry density and textures mean a low time to generate a frame which is why 90% of their games are 60fps even on extremely dated mobile hardware in the Switch. BotW and TotK are ridiculous in terms of both while having all of the physics systems and their interactions which is why they're 30fps. They also use double buffered V-Sync for both games which is why it both feels great for a 30fps game but also why it hard drops to 20fps when it does struggle to hit it's 33ms target.

Don't listen to the haters on here. Nintendo are absolute masters at being efficient with very limited hardware. The art teams at the Mario, Mario Kart, Zelda and Splatoon teams are also up there with the industries best like Insomniac, SSM, ND, Ubisoft and Rockstar.

They are going to blow minds with an RT / DLSS enabled Switch 2!

 

[JackMcGunns]

They run an alogorithm called "Acceptance" and a routine called "Gamers will love me and won't bitch about it". Very effective and in reality, a non issue.

 

[Lucifers Beard]

I believe it’s because they run double buffer v-sync which makes 30fps in this case feel very responsive.

30fps can feel reasonable providing developers spend time making it feel responsive and not like your riding a bike through treacle.

 

[MarkMe2525]

Let's take Zelda Botw and Totk.

Despite the framerate of both games running at 30fps and even dipping into the 20's the game feels silly smooth. I never notice input lag or stuttering I never notice choppy movement or that sluggish feel, both games are smooth as silk.

Idk if there is any other developer capable of putting games at the scale of Botw and Totk on switch hardware. When every other developer makes games at 30fps it's easy to tell. Most experience the symptoms I listed above.

I don't mean to keep stroking Nintendo off but you have to give credit where it is due. What is the secret sauce?

I believe it has more to do with the animations. Speaking of Zelda specifically, they don't bog your interactions down with slow detailed animations. When you press a button, Link immediately is performing intended action in a snappy manner.

 

[Cert.in.Death]

Simply put:

You choose to ignore it.

 

[ChoosableOne]

He is correct about ToTK. Sometimes I forget that I'm playing a game at 30 fps. My old messages stating that I wouldn't play Zelda at 30 fps are still on GAF lol. Perhaps it could be related to the game having an anime-like appearance. The action level is also not too high, which may contribute to that too.

 

[ZoukGalaxy]

Once upon a time, gaming companies were run by people who were gamers. Now days games have 100+ million $ budgets and there are suits demanding that games are published as soon as possible. Optimizing for potatoes isn't cost-effective.

Apparently, Nintendo HQ didn't get your memo, they still manage to optimize their games ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

And who asking optimization for potatoes ? It's not a PC discussion, you got it all WRONG. And it have been a long time since devs are not more gamers in a cave, what year it is ?

Also, you still find optimized game when they are exclusive to a specific platform (console AGAIN), so, that argument is not valid. Last of Us on PS3 was a technical marvel back in time as well as a lot of PS3 exclusives (All Quantic Dream games from PS4 era, and they were heavy budget games) while multi platform games run like ass on PS3 (Skyrim..) and the Xbox 360 got most of time the better version (even on non Bethesda games).
Also, look at God Of War on PS4, how much it costed ? A lot, and they managed to make it possible on PS4, that's what we call optimization.

Budget is just irrelevant and not a sign of optimized or un-optimized, it's more a choice from devs from the start and, more importantly, a culture inside the studio.

 

[NiiloPielinen]

Apparently, Nintendo HQ didn't get your memo, they still manage to optimize their games ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

And who asking optimization for potatoes ? It's not a PC discussion, you got it all WRONG. And it have been a long time since devs are not more gamers in a cave, what year it is ?

Also, you still find optimized game when they are exclusive to a specific platform (console AGAIN), so, that argument is not valid. Last of Us on PS3 was a technical marvel back in time as well as a lot of PS3 exclusives (All Quantic Dream games from PS4 era, and they were heavy budget games) while multi platform games run like ass on PS3 (Skyrim..) and the Xbox 360 got most of time the better version (even on non Bethesda games).
Also, look at God Of War on PS4, how much it costed ? A lot, and they managed to make it possible on PS4, that's what we call optimization.

Budget is just irrelevant and not a sign of optimized or un-optimized, it's more a choice from devs from the start and, more importantly, a culture inside the studio.

Not all but most. Potatoes was exaggeration. Some few aim for quality but if you think that the suits at EA / UBI / Activision etc bother to go beyond "good enough" on anything other than current top gpus, then you are wrong. Besides, Nintendo actually have their own hardware specialists available for their devs and try to maintain image of quality on their top games.

Budget is irrelevant for optimization? You think devs can magically optimize their code without it taking any more time than usual? That they just choose at the start of the project to not write optimized code?

Time is money. Optimization takes time.

 

[Noxxera]

Eh ToTK performs as good as any other polished game. Like Last of us 2 on PS4 pro for example. Secret sauce? Good programmers, one of best in business?

 

[ahtlas7]

30fps is an artistic decision

 

[GymWolf]

Lmao, it's very simple, they really don't, you feel every bit of frame drop in zelda unless you are one of those guys that can't notice a framedrop not even when it's fucking your loud wife in the room next you.

 

[Moses85]

@OP
Ever played

Hyrule Warriors - Age of Calamity ?​

 

[Team Andromeda]

Let's take Zelda Botw and Totk.

Easy when you're using an engine made for the Wii U and use child-like graphics for all your games. Let's see NCL make a realistic game with real humans, based on the real world and see how they would get on with frame rates. I will say mind, noone is better at Q&E for games than NCL- Their bug testing dept is the best in the business and has been for years

 

[Filben]

Not only Nintendo. Uncharted on the PS4 or older titles on the PS3 felt pretty responsive for being 30fps, or HZD on PS4.

Then you have Cyberpunk or Rise of the Tomb Raider that has so much input delay with 30fps that I can't comprehend how you're supposed to hit anything in these games. Feels like V-Sync input delay times two.

There was an article about several games input latency somewhere and it is rather a per-game basis issue (engine? devs?) that is even more pronounced when playing on low fps and V-Sync enabled (which most console games do).

Anyways, it's not a Nintendo specific thing (although another example is Bayonetta Origins which is also pretty responsive for a 30fps game).

 

[existensmaximum]

Eh ToTK performs as good as any other polished game. Like Last of us 2 on PS4 pro for example. Secret sauce? Good programmers, one of best in business?

ToTK slugs down pretty frequently though? If there is a lot enemies, fire and other stuff going on at the same time. The Last of Us 2 is rock solid, always. Not really a fair comparison but anyway.

 

[daclynk]

@OP
Ever played

Hyrule Warriors - Age of Calamity ?​

Was that Developed by Nintendo?

 

[Noxxera]

ToTK slugs down pretty frequently though? If there is a lot enemies, fire and other stuff going on at the same time. The Last of Us 2 is rock solid, always. Not really a fair comparison but anyway.

So you're essentially saying OP is an idiot and there's no magic in ToTK. Well I'm not arguing with you there. I'm impressed by the draw distance in ToTK tho.